Strategies for the Future: A Paradigm Shift in Management

When we put all the pieces, the arguments, case studies, and propositions together, we can finally see the complete picture: Lastingly viable enterprise and viable management need us to come up with a different mental model than the one inculcated in us by current economic theory. Like a counterpoint, it relates to the key forces powering today’s accelerating spiral of globally unbound markets. We also need to reject the mental model of current responsibility thinking put forward by the scholars of business ethics in their vain attempts to stop the exploitation of our planet’s resources. If we take all of this together, we are looking at a basic shift in paradigms, taking us away from today’s ideas of economics and business management and leading us to new concepts of sustainability, responsibility, competitiveness, viable management, and strategy development. This paradigm shift concerns our perceptions of economic theory and of markets, of the criteria for good management, the ways to get competitive advantages, and the yardsticks and criteria for successful enterprise. The shifting paradigms case a new light on the core competences we need for our future and on the nature of an economic order and management practice with future viability.